July 5, 2013

Does Social Confidence Improve By Itself Over Time?

Our typical emotional reactions to certain types of situations often change over time, without us deliberately trying to change them. This applies for social confidence as well, which is a motive that gets many people who are shy or socially anxious asking themselves: will my social confidence improve over time, if I just wait?

Of course, it’s comforting to think that it does. All you have to do is wait, do nothing, and eventually you’ll stop being shy and be more confident. But could this be true? Here is my answer, based on my 5+ years of experience as a confidence coach.

First of all, in my experience, there is no universal rule. When people who lack social confidence do not attempt to change this, there are several directions their social confidence can take on its own: sometimes it does indeed improve on its own, other times it gets worse, and other times it stays about the same.

The General Rule

Nevertheless, there is a general rule. There is a trend that you’ll see happening in about 80% or more of the cases. And this trend is that, unfortunately, unless you do something to improve your social confidence, it will gradually get worse over time, not better.

It’s not only my experience. Other coaches or psychologists who work with people with shyness or social anxiety have noticed this phenomenon; and various longitudinal studies of people with shyness or social anxiety point to the same conclusion.

up-downWhy is this? Here’s the explanation.

Over time, individuals who are at least moderately socially confident go out, meet people, have social interactions, and maintain an active social life.

Slowly but slowly, these experiences build their social skills and social intelligence. They get even better at understanding other people and relating to them, as well as understanding social dynamics and navigating them. This in time makes them even more confident.

Meanwhile, individuals who perceptibly lack social confidence avoid social events and they stay at home to play computer games or surf the net instead. Thus they get little social experience, so their social skills and social intelligence barely improve.

This widens the gap between their social competence and that of others around them. While others become more smooth and charismatic socially, learn how to be witty and read subtle social cues, they still don’t even know how to talk to people and hold a normal conversation.

And being aware of this widening gap, they feel even more nervous in social situations. The more they are left behind socially, the less socially confident they are. And that’s the sad truth.

The Biggest Exception

Out of all the exceptions, there is one big one though, which I would like to point out.

As I said, for some people, their social confidence does improve by itself over time. Most often, this is because they achieve success in some other area of their life and this improves their self-image.

For instance, maybe they achieve success in their professional life by constantly honing their job-related skills. They climb the career ladder, they get professional recognition or they make a lot of money.

This makes them feel better about themselves, and see themselves as more entitled to be liked by others. So they go into social settings with a newly discovered confidence, which makes it easier for them to have social interactions, which gets them more social experience, which gets them more social skills, which makes them even more confident, and a positive cycle ensues.

However, even this exception has its own big exception. Many times, even if a person does achieve great success in some other area of their life, it will not make them more socially confident at all.

Because as you already know if you’ve watched this instructional video I created, the correlation between your achievements in life and your social confidence is frequently very small. You can be the smartest, wealthiest and most capable person in the room, but your mind can still mess with you and make you feel like a loser.

This, along with the fact that the general rule is for social confidence to decrease over time if it’s already not very good, means that there is only one sensible thing to do if you lack social confidence: seek to do something about it.

The Really Good News

The best news is that you can take charge. Your confidence will likely go down over time if you do nothing. Maybe you’ve already experienced this. However, fortunately, you can do something to make your confidence go up like a rocket instead.

First of all, you can take action instead of waiting and just reading stuff. You need to start working deliberately at changing the way you see yourself, others and social situations, as well as the way you relate to others in social situations, in order to build your confidence.

Secondly, the technology you apply for building social confidence has to be effective. There is a lot of generic, repetitive and simplistic advice out there for overcoming social insecurities, and it just doesn’t work.

This is why I encourage you to get yourself a copy of my Conversation Confidence guide.

It’s a practical, proven transformational program, and it will teach you a highly effective, step-by-step formula for turning shyness and social anxiety into social confidence. Check it out here, and have a look at the testimonials here.

As you gain some social confidence and your social life begins to improve, it’s even easier to get additional social confidence and enhance your social life even more. Conversely, the more you wait and do nothing, the worse your social confidence gets and the harder it is to pull yourself out of the whole you’re in.

So, no matter how low your confidence level is right now, know you can completely upgrade it, and wait no more. It’s time to take action!

Image courtesy of jenny downing

Filed Under: Attitude, Psychology Tagged With: , , , 2 Comments
February 9, 2013

Are You Wasting Precious Time?

I often say that the most valuable resource we have in life is time. Time is the only resource that cannot get replenished. You can perhaps extend it a bit by living healthy, but beyond that what you get is what you get, and your responsibility is to use it wisely.

So if there is one thing that bothers me, it’s the reckless wasting time. Which seems to be the main hobby of many of us. Until one day we realize that we’ve let most of our life fly by and we’ve done so little with it when we could have done so much.

Considering this, I’d like to give you a simple roadmap to help you avoid wasting precious time and make the most out of your own life.

It’s All About Your Values

What does it mean to use your time well? I believe it means to use it doing things that are aligned with your values, with the things that are most important to you. Now the trick is that each person has their own unique set of values. Examples of such values include:

  • Having fun;
  • Helping others;
  • Interacting with others;
  • Creating;
  • Learning, etc.

Depending on your own values, using your time well will have a unique significance for you. Your first task regarding this is to ask yourself: “what is most important to me in life?” and seek to identify your dominant values with as much precision as possible.

Aligning Your Life with Your Values

Once you have a good understanding of your own values, it’s time to get as many activities as possible in your program that are well aligned with them and cut out the ones that are not.

time

You’ll have to do a realistic assessment of how you use your time each day and start making steady changes until your use of your time is well aligned with your values. In general, there are three types of errors you can spot in the way you use your time right now:

1) Living by other people’s values. This is when you invest your time doing something that others or society in general tell you that you should do, but they don’t truly match your values.

For example, seeking to build a family because that’s what most people do, although personally you don’t actually want a family and you don’t feel it would make you happier. This is why it’s important to get clear on what matters to you, and assess the actions you take based on your own values.

2) Seeking instant gratification. This is when you do something that quickly satisfies one of your values, although there are alternatives that require more time and effort but in terms of quality are radically better.

For instance, chatting with a friend on Facebook when you could go out with them and chat face to face. Although the second option will prove much more gratifying if connection is an important value for you, you have to invite them out, get out of the house, go somewhere and meet them. Which delays the gratification, but it’s worth it.

3) Not leaving your comfort zone. This means doing things that are trouble-free, instead of challenging yourself, even if the pleasure they give you is feeble and it fades quickly.

For example, maybe you value freedom a lot and you could achieve a lot more freedom by starting your own business and turning it into a success. But this implies risks and uncertainty and you don’t want that, so you choose to stay in your regular 9 to 5 job, which is comfy but not at all fulfilling in terms of freedom.

Fortunately, by clarifying your top values and assessing how you use your time based on them, you can realize when you’re letting one or more of these 3 errors take hold of your time and squander it.

Then all you need is the fortitude and determination to correct these errors and make the best use of your valuable time and your irreplaceable existence. And these are traits that you can develop with practice, plus a bit of patience. Remember: all you have is one life. Live it wisely.

PS: Two of my articles have been recently published on DatingAdvice.com. One is on approaching women, the other is about long-term relationships. Check them out; I think you’ll like what you’ll learn.

Image courtesy of wowyt

Filed Under: Inspirational, Lifestyle Tagged With: , , , 2 Comments
July 28, 2011

Feels Like You’re Running Out Of Time?

I think that one of the most dreadful feelings to have is the feeling that you’re running out of time. That life is passing by you and you’re not doing the things you want to do, you’re not living it the way you could be living it.

Really, apart from physical pain, I can’t think of any worse kind of pain than the sadness resulting from the perception of wasting your life. And if like me, you don’t believe in life after death, reincarnation or any of that stuff, and you believe this life is all you have, it only magnifies it.

Where does this very common feeling of sorrow stem from? In my view, there are three major sources.

1. Failing to Achieve Your Goals

The first source has to do with your life not turning up the way you want it to turn out.

Maybe you don’t have that high-level job you’ve always dreamed of, or you don’t make the kind of money you want to make, or you don’t have the relationship you want to have, or you don’t look the way you desire.

Considering that in the society most of us are living in, we are encouraged to set lofty goals for ourselves and build our lives around them, this source of discontent is quite widespread.

However, it’s worth pointing out that not achieving certain goals in and of itself does not lead to unhappiness, unless you attach yourself to your goals. Which takes me to my next point.

2. Attachment to Your Goals

Fortunately for me, I’ve met quite a number of people who are able to enjoy life extensively despite not having achieved their goals. I say fortunately because this kind of people tends to be the exception more than the rule.

Yes, they have goals and they work at achieving them. But not having achieved them doesn’t make them feel sadness and regret. Why? Because they are able to draw satisfaction from life in itself, not just from reaching goals.

Reaching their goals would temporarily increase their happiness, but that doesn’t stop them from having fun each day, doing things they enjoy, being self-amusing and making the best out of life as it is.

Ironically, this attitude of detachment, as most psychological studies suggest, will only increases their chances of success. Happiness breeds success even more than success breeds happiness.

3. Perfectionism

Last but not least, I think one of the central issues that prevent people from being happy is the tendency to aim for inflated ideals and only allow themselves to be happy if they achieve them.

It’s not enough make a good living; you need to be a millionaire. It’s not enough to have a nice house; you need to live in a mansion. It’s enough to have cool friends; you need to hang out with P. Diddy. It’s not enough to have a lot of qualities, you need to be perfect.

This kind of perfectionism creates the staggering situation we see today in developed countries: people have more money and more options than ever, yet the depression rate is sky high.

What gives? It’s only another shred of evidence that it’s not what you have that matters; it’s how you use it.

Stop, Look and Listen

Ultimately, I think in order to truly enjoy life, most people need to make a shift in attitude. They need to stop focusing exclusively on chasing increasingly higher goals and learn to embrace life as it is.

Now, notice I used the word ‘learn’. This is because it’s not something you just do. It’s a way of looking at things, at yourself and at life. It’s a way of living and a way of being. And it requires adequate practice and commitment to assimilate it.

Perhaps it’s time to put some distance between your goals and your happiness, and not let the later be dependent on the former. Aim high, but don’t be a perfectionist. Act to reach your goals and improve your life, never give up on your goals, but don’t let the fact you’re not reaching your destination dismay you.

Focus on enjoying the journey. The destination is secondary.

Image courtesy of wowyt

Filed Under: Attitude, Inspirational, Lifestyle Tagged With: , , 5 Comments
April 21, 2011

Guys, It’s Time to Seduce with Style

If you’re a guy and you want more social and dating success, there are a lot of personal tweaks you can make to achieve this. Interestingly enough, I find that enhancing your look, which is a relatively accessible change to make, is an often ignored one.

I’m not talking about your looks here; I’m talking about your look; about the way you use your looks and project your personality through clothes, accessories and body-language.

Over the past few weeks, whenever I would talk with another guy about men’s fashion and building a personal look, I would find myself keenly recommending the same one ebook. So, I decided to review it here.

The ebook is called Seduce with Style. It’s the best information product I know for men who want to develop a personal look that boosts their social life and their success with women.

You can get the full details about the ebook here.

Also, check out this free SWS chapter about the 8 most common style mistakes to avoid.

Why Style Matters

Do you need to dress well and have style in order to be an attractive guy? In my perspective, absolutely not. Does it help? You’ve better believe it.

In fact, I think learning to dress with style as a guy is such a good move that if you’re looking to improve your social and dating life, this is what you should start with.

Optimizing your look as a guy involves significantly less effort than other personal changes and you’ll instantly see positive results: people (read girls) looking at you more, smiling more, flirting with you more etc.

Girls typically react to a guy’s look much more than to his looks. Often without even realizing it, they rate guys based on their look and what it sub-communicates. Then they often justify how we they react to a guy by invoking other, ‘less superficial’ factors.

I ignored the power of a stylish personal look for the most part of my life. I didn’t understand look, I only understood looks. But when I did start paying attention to the clothes I wore and to developing a personal style, I was floored by the positive impact.

Eventually, I realized there is a deeper, more subtle meaning to clothing and style, and that your look goes beyond your looks.

My Review of Seduce With Style

AlphaWolf, the author of Seduce with Style, is an Attraction Style Coach. I had an awesome conversation with him this week about the ebook, men, women, seduction and life, and I was impressed by his pragmatic thinking and his passion for what he does.

The ebook he wrote is not your average what-to-wear and how-to-tie-a-tie book for men. It digs into the underlying principles of men’s style and sexual communication, in order to teach men how to develop a seductive and expressive style.

As a guy, you’ll find in Seduce with Style practical advice on choosing and matching clothing pieces, adapting clothes to your constitution, choosing colors, layering clothes and accessorizing.

You will also find a powerful approach to your look as a way of communicating certain characteristics and seducing. One of my favorite sections of the book is the one about the 8 Style Attraction Switches and how to integrate them into your look.

Bottom line: if you’re a guy and you want to become more seductive, definitely take a look at your look. And if you do so, definitely get your copy of Seduce with Style in order to enhance your look.

Check out Seduce with Style here.

When you dress well and you know it, the challenges in your social life don’t disappear overnight, but they do become much easier to surpass.

Image courtesy of glitterygin20

Filed Under: Lifestyle, News, Success Tagged With: , , , , , , 3 Comments